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more opportunities to sit at the table. More communica- tion and more dialogue has to continue.”
Never losing sight of the people: Brian Warner, chair- man of the Chicago Police Survivors Group that reaches out to members who have been involved in shootings, stabbings, auto accidents or other traumatic incidents, cites an indelible image that he believes should remind all officers of what they achieve in Chicago each day. You probably have seen Warner advocating for this in his re- cent appearances on “60 Minutes” and CNN.
He mentioned something he saw on television news recently of a Chicago Police Officer playing catch with a young person. He wants to remind that this happens every day in Chicago.
“I used to shoot baskets with kids in Cabrini-Green back in the day,” he explains. “I had colleagues in the 18th Dis- trict who would arrest a guy for panhandling because he was trying to get enough money to buy a sandwich. While he was processing the guy, he went and bought him the sandwich. This past Christmas, another officer used his entire overtime check to help a grandma buy presents for her grandkids because their parents were nowhere around. It’s what we do every day.”
Warner also reminded that the CPD handles nearly 2 million calls per year, and only a handful of them go south.
Voice recognition: From the makeup of the Lodge 7 Ex- ecutive Board to the reaching out to bring more members into events to growing relationship with the Chicago FOP Family Auxiliary to its support in the communities, the union is trying to be more formidable about promoting
diversity. “Not only in the workplace, but everywhere we go we have taken steps to ensure there’s a voice for all the different groups out there,” President Angelo reminds.
See it in the magazine: The development of Chicago Lodge 7 Magazine in September 2015 gave the union a way to get more information out to members than ever before. It wasn’t without some internal struggle, “but it was long overdue,” Angelo, Sr. adds. “It looks good. Mem- bers look forward to it and they enjoy it.” It has saved the union more than $100,000 a year on the cost of producing its newsletter.
Insight: If you have ever been on the third floor of 1412 W. Washington Boulevard when one of the challenges comes to, let’s say a head, then you have seen what Ca- siano believes is one of the critical incident management attributes for the Lodge.
“I think having Dean Angelo Sr. there as captain of the ship helped us come through our journey in 2016 with cooler heads prevailing,” he shares. “With everything we have had to bob and weave through, that has really helped bring back some of the morale for the officers.”
Because 2017 is a contract year, much of the union focus will be negotiating a new collective bargaining agreement with the City. Given the state of Chicago, the objectives for that negotiation begin with some basics.
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